maminature:

I’m erotic but uninterested, this is probably how prince feels

friendshipandlabor:

day 1 on tumblr left island: language barriers are being transcended as everyone shouts “fuckin liberal” to each other 

2ol:

Leelah’s final wish was for everything she had to go towards transgender charities. Due to the circumstances it’s doubtful her parents will follow through with her wishes. Please consider donating to places like TransOhio, Kaleidoscope Youth Center, or Trans Lifeline in her honor.

transsexualists:

any parent who opts for conversion therapy instead of transitioning for their trans child who then ends up committing suicide is a murderer

As Pakistan continues to mourn and grieve over the horrific attack last week in the city of Peshawar, there has naturally been a strong desire on the public’s part to figure out how to eliminate the disease of murderous radicalism. However, the ubiquitous calls for revenge and ‘their blood’ do little to shed light on sensibly understanding and tackling the problem. The frenzied rush to ‘do something,’ or that ‘we must respond,’ very often tends to lead to both counterproductive and grossly immoral actions on the part of nations. In this context, Pakistani society has seen the reemergence of, sadly, a tired, favorite punching bag of the nation: Afghan refugees.

-

One would think that after suffering both decades of vicious internecine warfare in their own country, and assuming the ‘wretched of the earth’ refugee status in another – Afghan refugees would be the quintessential candidate of an oppressed people in need of sympathy, solidarity, and support. The irony is that the opposite happens in Pakistan, particularly when some terrorist incident takes place which can immediately (albeit nonsensically) be laid at the footsteps of the entire Northwest of the country – as well as on Afghanistan. The country undergoes a collective psychosis wherein Pakistanis are asked to suspend any critical thinking – or thinking period – and simply accept a narrative of ‘who’s to blame’ that’s handed to the public on a platter.

A question rarely asked is what the heck are so many millions of Afghans doing in Pakistan in the first place, and how many of them are now second and third generation ones residing here and still not so keen on returning to their home country. The history should be familiar to every Pakistani by now: Afghan refugees came to Pakistan because of a vicious, bloody war that began in Afghanistan in the late 1970s, and which has plagued the country ever since. And outside powers, including Russia, Pakistan, Sauda Arabia, the US, and the entire Western establishment, played no small part in fueling that war then. A simple conflict inside Afghanistan for genuine Afghan self-determination was converted into a global proxy war between the two superpowers, with the rise of militant Islam being one of the major consequences. But the other significant one was the natural flight of poor Afghans from their country into neighboring Pakistan. The desire to escape bombs, Soviet troops, and reactionary elements within the ‘mujahideen’ does not seem unreasonable, and since Pakistan saw no compunction in interfering and sending ‘its boys’ (who were heavily armed) into Afghanistan – the movement of people in reverse (Afghans to Pakistan) should not, in principle, have been a problem for Pakistanis either. To put it rather bluntly: boys and weapons (and related training and funds) were sent from Pakistani to Afghanistan, and the chickens simply came home to roost. The innocent millions trying to seek refuge in Pakistan were simply ‘collateral damage’ of these power plays.

Therefore, before Pakistanis see themselves as so benevolent, demonstrating their magnanimity toward poor – but ‘bothersome’ – Afghan refugees, it would be useful to pause and reflect on this: do Pakistanis really think that millions of people all of a sudden one day enthusiastically decide to migrate across the border, leaving their entire lives behind them? No, it is almost always the result of a forced displacement, of conditions becoming so unbearable that there is no other choice left. The Pakistani state was deeply complicit in producing those conditions in Afghanistan, in the same way that the US was directly responsible for creating horrible socio-political conditions in Central America in the 1980s that led to hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing to Uncle Sam – only to be told now they are an ‘undeserving menace’ to society and need to be deported and/or criminalized, or even worse if the Tea Party had its say. The rhetoric sounds eerily familiar, and has parallels in Pakistan when it comes to the Afghans.

Afghan Refugees and the Displacement of Blame

(via stay-human)

anoratheirin:

just a really quick drawing of anora?? 

medicine:

only on tumblr will i see people applaud the IDF for going vegan

I think for a lot of women reading lesbian romance makes them have to confront their own anxieties and insecurities about their bodies and their sexualities as well as other women’s bodies and sexualities. […]


It is so much easier to think about male bodies and male sexualities which are constructed as natural, normal and overwhelmingly positive. Sexualized cisgender male bodies are not associated with the same kind of body policing or shaming […] that sexualized female bodies are.

E.E. Ottoman: Why Is Lesbian Romance So Unpopular When Compared to Gay or Straight Romance? (Read the whole thing!)

you have to also be able to recognize the ways you hurt other people not just the ways people hurt you

Whether you’re overseas or across the river in Jersey, there’s no longer any need to watch “NYPD Blue” for a glimpse at the famed officers. You can simply walk outside. The force operates in 11 foreign cities, including London, Lyons, Hamburg, Tel Aviv and Toronto. This year they added Kfar Saba, Israel, to their list of conquests — there, the NYPD has its own office complete with a department insignia and a banner inside which reads, “The New York Police Department. The Greatest Police Department in the World.” NYPD officers have flown to Afghanistan, Egypt, Yemen, Pakistan, and Guantanamo, where they have been known to conduct “special interrogations,” according to New York Magazine. Domestically, the NYPD collaborates with the FBI in Washington. Under Commissioner Kelly’s watch, and with the blessing of the CIA, the force has also built a hidden counterterrorism bureau, complete with a Global Intelligence Room and a security area protected by ballistic Sheetrock.

Nine terrifying facts about America’s biggest police force

The nine-point list is from 2012 but remains even more relevant in 2014, given the fact that militarized nature of NYPD’s law-enforcement that has only increased ever since.

(via s3p0y)

medicine:

so when are self-proclaimed sj bloggers gon accept the fact that only about 10-11% of people in the u.s. military come from poor neighborhoods

anagennao:

A rabbi and 3 Jewish children were shot and killed at Ozar Hatorah school in Toulouse, France [x]

nearby, at the Jewish Museum of Belgium in Brussels, 3 Jewish people were killed in a shooting [x]

I’ve not seen any post about this so I’m making this one. Antisemitism is alive and thriving in Europe.

I am dying to see you topless...

angelic-corpse:

then die

starfleetspectre:

that dogs getting a little old isn’t he alistair?

yonoa:

volcarona:

when they remake sinnoh it better be in 4D or something I want to be inside the game

i want it to be in 0D so the game doesnt exist in any dimensions

barbieprivilege:

girls in public who compliment your shoes=are cute and nice; real recognizes real

guys in public who compliment your shoes=probably are thinking abt fucking them or something else weird and dark

ihaveabsolutelynoidea:

i think trying to make gender this pomo free for all, devoid of power and consequences, comes at the expense of the people whose gender puts them at the shit end of social structures

apfelgranate:

1. i stumbled across this concept art and thought, clearly, this is something solas needs to wear


2. i’ve been meaning to draw concept art solas for ages


3. here we are

i just like the whole “young solas whit this haircut” idea so much

NEED TO DRAW IT MOAR

priceofliberty:

hugsfromhugo:

A solar eclipse and the Milky  Way seen from the ISS

I am practically in tears over how beautiful this image is.

huffingtonpost:

At Least A Third Of All Women Murdered In The U.S. Are Killed By Male Partners

divalopment:

luzfosca:

Fritz Henle, Cleaning woman in MOMA, 1950s

source

when I experience the daily racism and microaggressions of art history grad school, I remember that these spaces were made with our exclusion in mind

bobdylansgrandson:

dont even look at me unless you would die for me

thedoctorheretohelp:

If you are white, your job is to look, to listen, and to amplify the voices of people of color. This is not about you. This is not about your experiences and your view of this situation.

As white people, we are in no way able to comprehensively understand the vast scope and impact of institutionalized racism. We have a tremendous amount of privilege, and we need to use that privilege to amplify the voices of those who are actively being silenced.

bronyparctears:

Do you ever have a problem where you just don’t know how to reply to an argument, not because you don’t know the answer, but you just don’t know where to begin? Like, the foundation of knowledge you’d need to impart to this person before you could even begin to drag them out of their sinkhole of ignorance would cost thousands of dollars if it were coming from a university?

Hawke - Here Lies the Abyss

"The world fears the inevitable plummet into the abyss. Watch for that moment… and when it comes, do not hesitate to leap."

[gallery]

antoine-roquentin:

i found out about this yesterday. apparently most of the cops were drunk and had come from bars too.

sexnegative:

I hope that in 2015 we stop making everything about shitting on white male “cishets.” Cause it’s not just them being flagrant! For example! There are white gay and trans men doing shit. There are white women doing shit. There are heterosexual POC doing shit. There are male POC doing shit….

if you say "monosexual" or "bihet" like totally unironically and make elaborate political posts involving these ludicrous fucking words you probably should reconsider the bad life choices that led you to stray so far from god

Men hate intelligence in women. It cannot flame; it cannot burn; it cannot burn out and end up in ashes, having been consumed in adventure. It cannot be cold, rational, ice; no warm womb would tolerate a cold, icy, splendid mind. It cannot be ebullient and it cannot be morbid; it cannot be anything that does not end in repro­ duction or whoring. It cannot be what intelligence is: a vitality of mind that acts directly in and on the world, without mediation.

Traditionally and practically, the world is brought to women by men; they are the outside on which female intelligence must feed. The food is poor, orphan’s gruel. This is because men bring home half-truths, ego-laden lies, and use them to demand solace or sex or housekeeping. The intelligence of women is not out in the world, acting on its own behalf; it is kept small, inside the home, acting on behalf of another. This is true even when the woman works out­ side the home, because she is segregated into women’s work, and her intelligence does not have the same importance as the lay of her ass.

Men are the world and women use intelligence to survive men: their tricks, desires, demands, moods, hatreds, disappointments, rages, greed, lust, authority, power, weaknesses.

Some will grant that women might have a particular kind of intelligence—essentially small, picky, good with details, bad with ideas. Some will grant—in fact, insist—that women know more of “the Good,” that women are more cognizant of decency or kind­ ness: this keeps intelligence small and tamed. Some will grant that there have been women of genius: after the woman of genius is dead. They were sublime; and they were, all of them, shadows of what they might have been. But the fact that they existed does not change the cate­ gorical perception that women are basically stupid: not capable of intelligence without the exercise of which the world as a whole is impoverished. Women are stupid and men are smart; men have a right to the world and women do not. A lost man is a lost intel­ligence; a lost woman is a lost (name the function) mother, house­ keeper, sexual thing. Classes of men have been lost, have been thrown away; there have always been mourners and fighters who refused to accept the loss. There is no mourning for the lost intelligence of women because there is no conviction that such intelli­gence was real and was destroyed. Intelligence is, in fact, seen as a function of masculinity, and women are despised when they refuse to be lost.

Women have ignorant, moralistic prejudices; men have ideas. To call this a double standard is to indulge in cruel euphe­mism.

A woman must keep her intelligence small and timid to survive. Or she must hide it altogether or hide it through style. Or she must go mad like clockwork to pay for it. She will try to find the nice way to exercise intelligence. But intelligence is not ladylike. Intelligence is full of excesses. Rigorous intelligence abhors senti­mentality, and women must be sentimental to value the dreadful silliness of the men around them. Morbid intelligence abhors the cheery sunlight of positive thinking and eternal sweetness; and women must be sunlight and cheery and sweet, or the woman could not bribe her way with smiles through a day. Wild intel­ligence abhors any narrow world; and the world of women must stay narrow, or the woman is an outlaw… Even restrained intelligence is restrained not because it is timid, as women must be, but because it is cautiously weighing impressions and facts that come to it from an outside that the timid dare not face. A woman must please, and restrained intelligence does not seek to please; it seeks to know through discernment.

We take girls and send them to schools. It is good of us, because girls are not supposed to know anything much, and in many other societies girls are not sent to school or taught to read and write. In our society, such a generous one to women, girls are taught some facts, but not inquiry or the passion of knowing. Girls are taught in order to make them compliant: intellectual adventurousness is drained, punished, ridiculed out of girls. We use schools first to narrow the girl’s scope, her curiosity, then to teach her certain skills, necessary to the abstract husband. Girls are taught to be passive in relation to facts. Girls are not seen as the potential orig­ inators of ideas or the potential searchers into the human condition. Good behavior is the intellectual goal of a girl. A girl with intellec­ tual drive is a girl who has to be cut down to size.

Certain classes of women have been granted some privileges of literacy—not rights, privileges. The courtesans of ancient Greece were educated when other women were kept ignorant, but they were not philosophers, they were whores. Only by accepting their function as whores could they exercise the privilege of literacy. Upper-class women are traditionally taught some skills of literacy (distinctly more circumscribed than the skills taught the males of their mating class): they can exercise the privilege of literacy if they accept their decorative function. After all, the man does not want the breeding, bleeding bitch at the dinner table or the open cunt in the parlor while he reads his newspaper or smokes his cigar. Lan­guage is refinement: proof that he is human, not she.

…Girls and women are the illiterates, with two thirds of the world’s illiterates women and the rate rising steadily. Girls need husbands, not books. Girls need houses or shacks to keep clean, or street corners to stand on, not the wide world in which to roam. Refusal to give the tool of literacy is refusal to give access to the world. If she can make her own fire, read a book herself, write a letter or a record of her thoughts or an essay or a story, it will be harder to get her to tolerate the unwanted fuck, to bear the unwanted children, to see him as life and life through him. She might get ideas. But even worse, she might know the value of the ideas she gets. She must not know that ideas have value, only that being fucked and reproducing are her value.

Right-Wing Women by Andrea Dworkin (via mekosham)

gaydicks420:

we have to kill woody allen

warsofdystopia:

It’s sad how white people care more about the civil liberties of Sony Pictures than the civil rights of young black men in America.

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cultofkimber:

cayacayadeenyall:

cultofkimber:

quantumfemme:

seekingwillow:

priceofliberty:

salon:

Is this a human rights violation?

They’re being forced to risk their lives, so yeah I would say this is a violation of their right to life.

___

Everytime I look around, the US Govt, or some part there-of on  State or National level; is finding a way to reintroduce slavery.

Fucking hell. The prison industrial complex finds new ways to shock, revile and disgust every day.

This isn’t “a way to reintroduce slavery,” though. The 13th Amendment, which ended slavery, was very precisely written:

"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

This is why black people make up 14% of the US population and 40% of the prison population and why Native Americans make up less than 1% of the US population but 2% of the prison population.

This isnt slavery. These are people who commit crimes like murder and child molestation that are being punished for there actions through physical labor. God forbid they do something other than sit on their asses all day in jail.

Literally nothing you just said is based in fact. 

The men fighting these fires are all low-level offenders, primarily with charges for drugs, robbery, and other non-violent offenses (and, fyi, non-violent offenses are what 50% of state prisoners and about 90% of federal prisoners are incarcerated for). US prison has largely been a privatized, for-profit industry since the 1980s. Law changes like mandatory minimums for low-level crime have ensured that the incarceration rate has done nothing but skyrocket because private prisons need a steady flow of inmates to turn profit and our government is contractually obligated to provide that steady flow. Hell, drug-related charges account for over half of that rise of rate. Marginalized groups are targeted disproportionately for incarceration through systemic poverty, inaccessible education, social instability, etc (all which increase risk of drug abuse and other criminal behavior), racial profiling by LEOs, and by being given much harsher sentences than more privileged counterparts. And that’s without even touching on wrongful conviction rates, which are about 6% for violent crimes and estimated to be much higher with lesser offenses. 

And criminals are sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment. The confinement and denial of personal agency is the punishment. And prison is meant to serve two purposes: punishment and rehabilitation. Prison work programs are about neither—they exist primarily to defray costs of housing inmates (and, thus, increase profits for private prisons). And bondage, subjugation, and forced labor for other’s financial gain is practically the textbook definition of slavery, so idk what to tell you. There are lots of ways to keep prisoners from “sitting on their asses all day” that don’t involve treating these men and women as unworthy of humane treatment, empathy, and compassion. Hell, work programs are even a really viable option for that when approached with the right intentions.   

Seriously, I really urge you to do some reading about mass incarceration, racial disparities in incarceration, the privatization of the prison industry, etc. if you’re going to have an opinion on this stuff because ignorance isn’t a good look on anyone. 

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nolanlind:

i managed to renew my sephora VIB rouge membership for another year, so that means IT’S TIME FOR ANOTHER GIVEAWAY!

feel free to follow, and like and/or reblog this post for a chance to win one of three prize packages - the more you do, the better your chances of winning will be!

1. THE BIG ONE: i love coral and firmly believe it’s a universal shade. this makeup starter kit includes a sephora carry-all bag, a sephora brush roll, a beautyblender sponge and cleanser (also good for use with the brushes), hourglass setting/highlighting powder in dim light, nars blush and bronzer in orgasm/laguna, a smashbox eyeshadow trio in focal point, stila pencil liner in damsel, benefit gel liner in black, a benefit mini mascara, a fresh sugar tinted lip treatment in coral, and deborah lippmann nail polish in girls just wanna have fun. (recommended but not included: an eyelash curler)


2. SECOND PRIZE: i have a good feeling about First Aid Beauty as a brand. this gift set includes a facial cleanser, toning and brightening pads, a facial moisturizer, a lip treatment, and an eye cream.


3. LAST BUT NOT LEAST (actually kinda, sorry ‘bout it): just in time for spring/summer collection launches! this Tarte beauty-insider reward package includes their amazonian clay bronzer in park avenue princess, “gifted” amazonian clay mascara, self-tanner, an eye treatment, and a self-tanning face towelette sample sachet.

winners will be chosen and contacted on wednesday, december 31!

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family member: what are you doing with your life?
me: it's a surprise

There are many whites who are trying to solve the problem. But you never see them going under the label of liberals. That white person that you see calling himself a liberal is the most dangerous thing in the entire western hemisphere. He’s the most deceitful. He’s like a fox. And a fox is always more dangerous in the forest than the wolf. You can see the wolf coming, you know what he’s up to. But the fox will fool you. He comes at you with his mouth shaped in such a way that even though you see his teeth you think he’s smiling and take him for a friend.

Malcolm X on white liberals, 1963

Here’s Malcolm X explaining in more detail about the hypocrisy of white liberals: [1] [2]

(via myeongwol)

necspenecmetu:

Roman School, Saint Sebastian, c. 1615-20

The sign's best traits

gothstrology:

Aries - dtf and knows when something’s up

Taurus - hella loyal and gives great hugs

Gemini - none

Cancer - very maternal and kind

Leo -  loyal and will probably tell you if there’s something in your teeth

Virgo - intelligent and unbiased

Libra - cute lil fairies

Scorpio - great in bed 

Sagittarius - hilarious and honest mother fuckers 

Capricorn - great listeners and hard-working 

Aquarius - very open minded and accepting of your flaws

Pisces - creative and exciting to be around 

[audio https://www.tumblr.com/audio_file/bruixeria/106359736086/tumblr_nfve2sljkB1qz96iq?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio]

christiandinoor:

This song kills me in the best way.

tos—ka:

You can take the piece of shit out of the ghetto but you can never take the ghetto out of the piece of shit.

[gallery]

karkat-doodle-doo:

nubbsgalore:

the rain in the plain stays mainly on the mane. photos by michael nichols, anup & manoj shaw and paul & paveena mckenzie from serengeti national park, where there aren’t too many places for lions to hide from the rain. 

The lionesses are just like, “whatever”, while the males are complaing about their ruined manes

ihaveabsolutelynoidea:

cannot believe there are people who think de blasio hates the nypd just because he’s marginally left of center 

ihaveabsolutelynoidea:

for what it’s worth, the nypd always feels like they’re being attacked when they’re not granted permission to run rampant through the streets of new york like a lawless band of marauders

incorrectclassics:

thoodleoo:

i’m sorry, professors, but i can’t take my finals because Patroclus is dead

-Achilles, probably.

chlorineblondie:

corporations don’t care abt u, dove doesn’t want u to love ur body they want you to share their commercials on social media and buy their soap…..there is no such thing as a “feminist” ad campaign. 

fagmobs:

Is straight people eating ass cultural appropriation?

The fact is, a 14-year-old girl may be capable of agreeing to sex with a 49-year-old man, but she doesn’t have the emotional and mental maturity to consent. I was 25 before I realized that every man I’d slept with as a teenager was a pedophile. It seemed to me that since I’d courted the attention, that I was fully culpable. What teenager believes she is not mentally or emotionally capable of full consent? I thought I was an adult, although when I look at the picture of myself from the time period above, I see a child.

I thought I was the exception for these men, the girl so precocious and advanced that it superseded social norms. I thought that I was “older than my chronological age.”

It never occurred to me as a young sexually active teen that the adult men I had relationships with may have been manipulating me, that they had designs and motives I couldn’t see from my limited child’s perspective.

Emily, XOJANE, "The Myth of the Teenage Temptress, or Why a Young Girl Can Not Consent to Sex with an Adult Man"

Everyone should read this article if they haven’t already. The anecdotes are upsetting and carry major TW (pedophilia, graphic depictions of sex), but the message is just so on point. 

(via graculus)

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The funny thing is that the early reviews of the movie were pretty lukewarm, not just from critics but from regular test audiences. Now after this controversy, people are hailing it as the greatest comedy of our generation.

It’s also caused a resurgence of those stupid NORTH KOREA BEST KOREA memes. That’s just annoying, though.

What makes me angry is that by mocking North Korea, the mockers are reinforcing the DPRK’s state propaganda. If you think the North Korean government is stupid or you see them as toothless cartoon villains, then you’ve already been indoctrinated by it. Hook, line, and sinker. Without getting too much into my personal life, I have close ties with people deeply involved in North Korea. I’ve befriended DPRK defectors and people who have dedicated their lives to dismantling the Kim regime.

North Korea is the only Orwellian police state in the world and it has been that way for almost 70 years. Other nations have tried to maintain a government like the DPRK’s in the modern world and failed. The USSR broke apart. Fascist Italy fell. Nazi Germany fell. Gaddafi was ousted and killed.

Yet the DPRK endures. People don’t rebel, other countries don’t invade them, and they still receive concessions from the international community even as they continue developing their nuclear program. Stupid governments can’t keep 24.9 million people drinking the Kool Aid and force exponentially more powerful countries into bargaining positions.

A large part of why North Korea endures is because they’ve carefully engineered how they want to appear to the West. Horrific things are happening there right now. Some of my friends have been sent to juvenile concentration camps where kids were beaten and raped by the guards. Camps where kids had their feet cut off for attempting to escape. Friends who saw a fresh corpse on the street every day they walked home from school, left to starve to death on the sidewalk because of the Great Famine. Friends who were forced to eat bark to survive, friends who witnessed cannibalism.

There is so much information out there about how horrible and dangerous North Korea is but the international community doesn’t receive pressure from their constituents to do anything about it because everyone views North Korea as a joke. That is a very intentional, calculated move by the DPRK government. They are fully aware of how ridiculous and empty their threats sound. Those statements are nothing but propaganda fed to the West.

B.R. Myers is one of the world’s foremost scholars of North Korea and he pointed out that North Korea is not very socialist or communist. In fact, if you read the North Korean constitution, you won’t find a single mention of socialism or communism. But they are very Confucian, and a lot of what they talk about in their constitution is aligned with Confucian principles. That also goes for their foreign policy. It’s straight out of the Art of War. To quote Sun Tzu:

"If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them. If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected."

And that’s exactly what North Korea does. They know they can’t possibly withstand a military invasion from a first world power, but at the same time, they can’t risk a policy of close contact because it would compromise the internal propaganda they minister to their citizens.

So they make ridiculous threats they can’t possibly carry out. They get angry about comedy movies. They play the role of the tiny man with a huge chip on his shoulder, and the international community responds accordingly. The unspeakable atrocities North Korea is committing against its citizens is overshadowed by the global public perceiving North Korea as a cartoon villain. And when North Korea does do something legitimately dangerous like missile tests in Japanese waters or firing upon submarines, it is without warning, provocation, grandstanding, or boasting. Nothing came of the RKS Cheonan attack because there was no hard evidence that linked it back to the DPRK. Do you think an inept government can pull that off?

This is how they control their public image. It’s how they make it clear they are not to be fucked with when they want to be taken seriously, but when they need to relieve international pressure off themselves, they start talking like Darth Vader, and the laughs and mocking that follow work to North Korea’s benefit.

Did you know they’re also heavily involved in organized crime? You probably haven’t and you’ll never hear North Korea boasting about it, even though their criminal enterprises are a legitimate threat that causes actual damage overseas. They want to divert people’s attention away from things like Room 39 so they make wild threats they cannot possibly carry out and the international media eats it up. Room 39 is a multibillion dollar criminal enterprise but we have little information about it. People struggle to accept that the DPRK can run operations like this because of the misguided belief that the DPRK is run by boneheads.

Look at what the response has been like for their threats about The Interview. The DPRK knows damn well they can’t bomb any American movie theaters. But they used their grand, puffed up threats as propaganda. And it isn’t the first time they’ve indoctrinated the West with idle threats.

What’s the response to North Korean news on any popular media website? North Korea Best Korea! ROR! You are now banned from r/pyongyang! Any discussions about the concentration camps or human rights abuses are completely drowned out by stupid memes, stupid memes which exist because North Korea presented itself as an evil empire out of a sci-fi book and the West ate it up. North Korea is already associated with vapid memes in the eyes of young westerners. Now it’ll be associated with a slightly above average comedy movie and hammy threats, playing right into the belief that North Korea like a real-life version of Mordor or the Galactic Empire.

When you hear about the Galactic Empire killing trillions of people in Star Wars, you don’t feel anything because it’s exaggerated fiction. On a subconscious level, it’s easy to feel ambivalent towards millions of people being tortured, raped, and starved on a daily basis when you view the oppressing power in the same level of ridiculousness as Darth Vader.

But Kim Jong Un is not Emperor Palpatine. The Workers’ Party are not Sith Lords. They are completely sane, flesh-and-blood men and women no different from me or you who torture and imprison regular people.

Real people. People who are fathers, daughters, uncles, friends. Imagine if your family lived in a country where one misstep you make could land you and your children in the gulag. If you have daughters, you can expect them to be gang raped by guards. You can expect them to have forced abortions for carrying mixed children. If you have a relative that has special needs, expect them to be executed for polluting the gene pool.

When you step back and start deprogramming yourself from the media conditioning that North Korea has been feeding you, it’s not so easy to be so flippant about North Korea, is it? Suddenly it becomes as disturbing as joking about the deaths of Eric Garner and Tamir Rice, or creating memes out of the two NYPD officers who were murdered in cold blood simply for being in uniform. Picture that on a scale magnified by millions and perpetuated every single day.

So the fact that the world is congratulating itself for being so witty and edgy for mocking North Korea is what made me angry this week. I’ve seen more outrage against North Korea for bullying Sony into pulling this movie than I have when the UN released its report on North Korean concentration camps.

If the world was able to see North Korea soberly as the most brutal dictatorship in the world, it wouldn’t be such a pain in the ass convincing people to get involved. That’s harder to do now that everyone is lapping up the DPRK’s Kool Aid without realizing.

Why is this the issue Reddit wants to have protests over?

The real way to stick it to North Korea would be to start organizing mass donations to nonprofits dedicated to ending it, making their human rights abuses viral, and starting an online movement that pressure world leaders into breaking the Kim regime. That would actually scare the shit out of the DPRK.

TLDR
The Interview is out and millions are spending cash on watching it.

Sony & “The Interview” — what’s your take? (via sallydonovan)

Beauty is, in some way, boring. Even if its concept changes through the ages… a beautiful object must always follow certain rules. A beautiful nose shouldn’t be longer than that or shorter than that, on the contrary, an ugly nose can be as long as the one of Pinocchio, or as big as the trunk of an elephant, or like the beak of an eagle, and so ugliness is unpredictable, and offers an infinite range of possibility. Beauty is finite, ugliness is infinite like God.

Umberto Eco; On The History Of Ugliness. (via luxurypoetry)

simulatedcity:

me: burdensome mysticism
you: internally consistent belief system

la-erk:

quick painting

my 2015 new years resolution is to fight everyone alive on this planet

stardust-rain:

I find it funny (and by funny I mean I want to bash someone’s face in) that there is a sort of compartmentalisation that happens when it comes to making NK into an international enemy. Kim Jong Un and Kim Jong Il can simultaneously be overweight manchildren who mispronounce english and eat weird food (a la Team America) while the state itself is full of terrifying, powerful assasins with sights on destroying American Freedom (tm) (Olympus Has Fallen/Red Dawn).

Kim Jong Un is the perfect anti-Asian stereotype and he fits neatly into the mould of Hollywood’s racialised fictional enemies so in a mix of American arrogance and neo-imperialism, this film decided to use build on those sentiments and use the world’s most powerful media platform to further reinforce that. 

Hollywood needs a stock villain, and as a result North Korea was turned into the Face of the Ultimate Enemy as a by-product of anti-communism, misplaced patriotism and a mutated Yellow Peril that couldn’t be directed at China.

People are already forming the narrative about NK giving ‘retaliation’ and ‘revenge’ and throwing shitfits about ‘WHAT IF THEY KILL US IF THE MOVIE GETS LEAKED’ as if this were a fucking spy movie and not just another result of imperialistic cock-fighting. If you think this is actually something that’s going to happen, I hope you take a long look at the type of media you consume and reflect on the fact that you’re personally complicit in the fun new trend of creating imperialistic, anti-Asian media. 

Americans who are angry about about the interview being pulled are not getting angry because of the precious freedom of speech and if half of them knew jackshit about their own laws and constitution they would know that the First Amendment doesn’t protect you from private companies censoring/deleting/editing their own content. 

People are angry about the interview being pulled because in their arrogance and self-righteousness they think that American mass media has the right to dehumanise and make light of the suffering of an entire nation - and be protected from consequences because their media is the single most influential platform. 

People are not angry about North Korea being a dictatorship - they have never given two fucks about the country, or its people, or the fact that American policy during the Cold War helped create it.

They’re angry about the fact that they’re not allowed to capitalise, humiliate, dehumanise and mock that dictatorship in a cloud of comfortable self-righteous patriotic judgement while ignoring the people who suffer under it. 

America has been complicit in the oppression of NK and SK for years, through their politics, their foreign policy, through their media, through the way they talk about them. 

By all means, be angry at the Interview and the gigantic sack of shit that is James Franco, but let’s not forget that this film was the result of neo-imperialism of the ugliest sort, one that deliberately and strategically used long-circulated tropes to form a racist meta-narrative.

blaaargh:

teslawasright:

I feel like Myers Briggs results are like astrology for people who don’t believe in astrology.

They’re absolutely business-people horoscopes.

[gallery]

Animorphs was the only kid series to end with the heroes escaping conviction for war crimes due to a biased jury.

4chan on the Animorphs (via thejakeformerlyknownasprince)

[gallery]

christiandinoor:

A Koala reflecting on his sins, his triumphs, and the inevitability of death.

me

generally:

b0nes-and-suicide:

*hears intro to Sugar We’re Going Down* … *runs into room* AM I MORE THAN YOU BARGAINED FOR YET *kicks wall* I’VE BEEN DYING TO TELL YOU ANYTHING *punches chair* YOU WANNA HEAR *throws table* COS THAT’S JUST WHO I AM THIS WEEK

me in 2005 and still me in 2014 

That both Mitt Romney and Phil Robertson have and love black grandbabies should remind us that racism is not primarily about individual attitudes. White folks can love individual black people and still build a world that is inhospitable to black folks. In fact, individual and exceptional black achievers are necessary to maintain the lie of racial progress. Their presence has very little to do with systemic change, though.

Brittney Cooper, White Supremacy Wins Again: Melissa Harris Perry and the Racial False Equivalence (via checkprivilege)

Anyway I’m going to throw myself into the Atlantic and slumber for ages in the deepest trench I can find before being accidentally summoned by some teenagers playing Ouija. Then I will destroy this world.

I love when Americans assume I don’t know English because I’m brown and when Catalans assume I don’t know Català because I’m brown.

I love facing racism at every turn and never having a real home.

I love being a displaced immigrant trash heap who feels torn between two countries and is rejected by both of them ^_________^

pax-arabica:

cankrist:

ghostofcommunism:

pax-arabica:

Sigh, so you know how Gaza is still besieged and Israel has so far only let around 1% of rebuilding materials through?

Well fear not, because the materials needed to construct a Coca Cola manufacturing plant in Gaza got through!

Now hundreds of thousands will still be homeless for the cold winter, but at least they’ll be able to enjoy the fresh taste of capitalist exploitation :)

Fuck Coco Cola!

Perhaps it is because Hamas is refusing to use material to build houses, and is instead openly intending to use it  to build attack tunnels.

And maybe the siege is going on because Hamas repeatedly fires Rocket Propelled Grenades from Gaza threatening innocent lives on the other side.

Tell me more about how evil the Isreali-Capitalists are.

Why do people who obviously not know what the fuck is going on feel the need to add pointless commentary on themes that have already been debunked a million times?

First of all, it’s quite obvious that you don’t know how the mechanism of the rebuilding process is carried out, because it’s not Hamas who is responsible for it, that was a major condition upon donation. It will be carried out through the UN and other approved organizations exclusively. Hamas won’t get a cent of it.

Literally the only source saying that UN cement is going to Hamas is based on Israeli media reports, which are notorious for being mouth pieces for the government. Anyone who is an observer of the area for longer than 5 minutes can confirm this simply by looking at the 2006 Lebanon war, where Israelis tuned into a Hezbollah run news station because they were reporting more truthfully than the Israeli media, and its constant attempts at propaganda.

Secondly, even if it was, do you have any idea that the only reason half of the strip haven’t died of hunger already is because of the bloody tunnels you lot love to obsess about?

Does not a single one of you ask yourselves, WHY Hamas needs to build such an extensive tunnel network in the first place? Or is it just to attack Israel cos Hamas were born evil and poor Israel is under attack because freedom. You always look at events disconnected from their context and narrative, and forget to mention that Hamas was only created as a result of Israeli occupation.

Hamas literally arrested people firing rockets into Israel the other day, it does not want the ceasefire to end. It is not in its interest to escalate. Again, this is quite clear to anyone who knows anything about this.

And maybe, you should pick up a non Zionist history book because Gaza has been under siege and occupation decades before Hamas even existed. Woops. It’s almost as if Hamas has become a scarecrow to scare gullible uninformed people like you, and is not actually the source of the conflict! Wow! Since day one after the ceasefire Israel has been violating it, through incursions and bombings.

I can’t tell you more about how evil the Israelis are because anyone with a search engine can come up with 60 or so UN resolutions that Israel is breaching, about how it’s a de facto ethnocracy with de facto segregation in society, for gods sake even their schools are segregated. A country responsible for creating millions of refugees. This is a country you want to defend?

Then again, a lot of people thought they knew what they were talking about and thought themselves right about defending apartheid South Africa, and we all know how that ended.

Edit: Oh never mind, I just checked your blog. Go back to your fandom blogging and your “Why We Need Masculinism” posts. Lmao, I almost feel bad for taking the time to reply.

Solas: You were never going to wake up. How could you? A mortal sent physically through the Fade!
Inquisitor: A "mortal"?
Solas:
Solas:
Solas: A mortal, yes.
Solas: I'm a mortal, too, don't worry
Solas: *sweats*

[audio https://www.tumblr.com/audio_file/bruixeria/105924244031/tumblr_n56bbu3GPO1qkvcv8?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio]

lattesforlips:

"I’m Not Calling You a Liar (Dragon Age II: Varric’s Theme)" by Florence + The Machine for Dragon Age II (2011)

This rendition breaks my heart.

[gallery]

zeezrom:

The widow - Anders Zorn

tsunamiwavesurfing:

smh

lesbianturians:

me: i love all my da2 companions equally

me: [earlier that day] i don’t care for sebastian

medicine:

brah u.s. military soldiers/vets who condemn domestic state violence enacted by the police while ignoring or defending their own complicity in that same state violence via imperialism overseas never cease 2 amaze me

bearshapedhoneybottle:

being romantic completely ruins ur chances of survival 

juansrevenge:

Stove don’t work but still got that fire

only 2012 kids remember this

tourist: excuse me, could you give us directions to Olive Garden?
new yorker: No, but I could give you directions to an actual italian restaurant

The United States is a dangerous place, and the workplace in particular is far too dangerous for far too many. But if you want to thank someone for bravely facing down danger in order to make your way of life possible, thank your garbage collector or your taxi driver. When it comes to the cops, they’re mostly a danger to others. Instead of issuing them heavier armor than the occupiers of Iraq and Afghanistan, we should be talking about disarming them in the name of public safety.

Peter Frase

Lots of people are at risk on the job. But when it comes to cops, they’re mostly a danger to others. Here are some occupations with higher fatality rates than being a cop:

Logging workers: 129.9
Fishers and related fishing workers: 120.8
Aircraft pilots and flight engineers: 54.3
Roofers: 42.2
Structural iron and steel workers: 37.0
Refuse and recyclable material collectors: 32.3
Drivers/sales workers and truck drivers: 24.3
Electrical power-line installers and repairers: 23.9
Farmers, ranchers and other agricultural managers: 22.8
Construction laborers: 17.8
Taxi drivers and chauffeurs: 16.2
Maintenance and repairs workers, general: 15.7

Addendum: Glad to see the word occupiers used for American armed forces members because that is exactly what they do on imperial duty. They invade, occupy and kill. About which is nothing commendable.

(via mehreenkasana)

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The Artist Is Present, 2010

lace-rate:

There’s no difference between a police officer and a soldier of the same Empire. One executes brute force on the domestic front, the other delivers death in foreign lands. All American military soldiers trying to show how only the police force of the United States is violent, need to look in the mirror because you’re all the same. You’re all the fucking same.

lace-rate:

nov—-18th:

it’s weird that americans are afraid of north korea bombing the u.s. when history has demonstrated time and time again the u.s. is one of the few countries that can just bomb/invade any other nation with impunity

If yu look at anybody for long enough you start to see their beauty. Except whytes lmao don't look At them se te mete el diablo probably

me: *condemns the institution of the usa policing system*
liberals: yas! drag ha!
me: *condemns the institution of the u.s. military*
liberals: um that's problematic classist don't you know there's poor PoC in the military and gay people happily serve our country? :(

princessgarbagechan:

*posts a picture of some bread*

I BET YOU AMERICAN JACKFUCKS DON’T HAVE THIS.  IT’S CALLED WHEATBLUMPS AND YOU’RE ALL MORONS FOR NEVER HAVING EATEN IT.

Mother: BUT I GAVE BIRTH TO YOU!
Me: ain't nobody tell you to do that tho

sexnegative:

If I’m nice to you, it’s because I think you really deserve it. I’m actually kinda mean and am selective in who I am kind to.

[gallery]

beaugarit:

"Tomie: anaza feisu" (1999)

REMINDER

flaccidtrip:

america-wakiewakie:

Watching liberals and conservatives is so fucking comedic. Liberals literally worship Obama for propagating much of the same policies Bush did with some bones thrown to the liberal agenda every now and then while conservatives demonize him as a socialist lol. Obama is as much a socialist as an elephant is a donkey. I WISH that imperialist asshole was a socialist.

Like I have been so far out of the tiny world of the liberal/conservative false dichotomy that when I see how feverishly people get sucked into nowadays I am just flabbergasted. It’s a testament to the American propaganda machine. As disgusted as I am with it, I’m in awe of its effectiveness.

auntiewitch:

tumblr: a woman’s dating history or lack thereof does not decide or dictate her sexuality!
tumblr:
tumblr: unless she’s a lesbian

veinsofopal:

acrossthedas:

I’m convinced they programmed his walk here to emulate the gait of a wolf. 

He’s even single-tracking like a wolf, putting one foot directly in front of the other instead of staying to the sides. I think that was definitely their intention.

siryl:

"The Last Rites" by Dariusz Zawadzki, sourced from an interview page on Fantasy Magazine's website.  Warning: Links contain nudity and body horror.

[gallery]

monstreux:

“The mosque in Brixton attracts a lot of young Muslims who want to show off their style. Problem is – when you’re wearing a full-length dish dash – your only option to be stylish is through your trainers,” the photographer says, admitting that a lot of mosque-goers have even started to wear new trainers on Fridays – keen to be snapped. “The Brixton mosque attracts younger worshippers and the young people in Brixton are styling.” x

nietzscheisdead:

i feel like i can’t go anywhere anymore without people soothsaying my downfall. even the cashier at taco bell was all “the flock of crows taken to following you portent a disastrous and blah blah fucking blah,” i get it, i’m about to undergo a storm of tribulation, what frickin ever 

I know you don't usually comment on current events, but do you have any duaa to share for those grieving in Peshawar today?

partytilfajr:

Any Dua that is genuine from one’s heart is sufficient, I just would share this:

Imam al-Shafi’i once said: “There’s a verse in The Qur’an that is like an arrow in the heart of every oppressor and at the same time a source of comfort for the heart of the oppressed.”

People asked: “What is it?”

He said: “And never is your Lord forgetful [19:64].”

christiandinoor:

"The dried up river will revive again, but what about the fish who died?" (left)
by Shamsia Hassani, a young graffiti artist from Kabul, Afghanistan. 

‘Every character in my artworks is me, because my problem is the same as every other Afghan woman’s. Our problem is not the burqa but the war’.

to everyone forced into an uncomfortable family situation this holiday,

shinier-happier-people:

whether they belittle you for your political ideas, are racist/sexist/classist/homophobic/transphobic/ableist assholes, insist on using incorrect pronouns, or trigger you in some way, please know that you are loved and cherished elsewhere, your value is in no way diminished, and that someone is very thankful you exist.

zaynistani:

if you want to donate to the Edhi Foundation which is the group that’s treating the kids and arranging their funeral the links are all on this page  

If your solution for what happened is “even more military action” please don’t be surprised if I physically attack you. I can and will destroy you.

In Pakistan, in attempts to target these 41 men, 142 children have lost their lives to drone strikes.

Jennifer Gibson, staff attorney at Reprieve, appears on Democracy Now! to discuss the new report, “You Never Die Twice: Multiple Kills in the U.S. Drone Program.”

A new report finds U.S. drone strikes kill 28 unidentified people for every intended target. While the Obama administration has claimed its drone strikes are precise, the group Reprieve found that strikes targeting 41 people in Yemen and Pakistan have killed more than 1,000 other, unnamed people. In its attempts to kill al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri alone, the CIA killed 76 children and 29 adults; Al-Zawahiri remains alive.

(via fotojournalismus)

I can’t stop crying and I have to go to work in an hour and I don’t understand how I’m supposed to go to work and smile at my customers and pretend like a hundred children weren’t murdered. I don’t think I can.

I don’t understand how you can mock someone for turning to prayer at a time like this. When violence seems unending and there’s no solution and cruelty is everywhere. Sometimes the only solace is that those who escape their just dues in this life cannot flee forever. You have to believe there will be justice, even if it isn’t earthly justice.

I can’t stop crying. I feel overwhelmed by both the massacre itself and how callous some of the responses on my dash are. Mocking people for praying at a time like this? Really? God. My prayers are with those poor parents, with the families who have lost so much, with all of the Pakistani people caught in this horrific tug of war. May you find peace somehow. And may Allah punish those who escape justice in this life—they will find it in the next.

zanabism:

How many Muslim children have to be lined up and executed by the Taliban before the world recognizes that the oppressed do not deserve to be categorized with their oppressors?

c-poy:

They handpicked the children. They chose the children of army personnel. Like it or not, there are many uncomfortable conversations to be had. Mainly that this is retaliation for the NWA military operation going on funded by the United States of America. This is why your binary of religion versus secularism doesn’t fucking work or apply in this case.

al-teya:

..another kiss in the Fade, ma vhenan?

stayuglystayangry:

What I want to know is why people seem to act like calling yourself a slur is some cool fun empowered social club. slurs are dehumanizing and most people I know who have been called them (when it “matches” a truth about their lives/identities) feel a very deep and complex shame. Reclamation is a very bitter process and if you’re looking at it like “hey, how come I don’t GET to be called that?” Well you just answered your own question.

kismaayo:

Do u think white people don’t have lips for evolutionary reasons? Like they talked too much shit and this was The Lord’s way of trying to shut them up

icravethatmineral:

zadokthepriest:

Handy chart I found online

This really satisfied my cravings, 10/10

c-poy:

I wish people realized that hating men is not a form of entertainment that many of us opt for but a mode of survival for countless women, and that it isn’t as sexy and fun as liberal feminism would have you believe but actually extremely exhausting and depressing.

sixpenceee:

Alpine Ibexes climb nearly 90 degree angles to lick salt deposits of of mountainsides. They crave that mineral. (Source)

https://vine.co/v/OhzQMzeBbjv/embed/simple

(Source: https://vine.co/)

[audio https://www.tumblr.com/audio_file/bruixeria/105134997366/tumblr_n69jarkbWF1r6v7v8?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio]

Grizzly Bear |"He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)" [The Crystals Cover]

Say surrender. Say alabaster. Switchblade.
            Honeysuckle. Goldenrod. Say autumn.
Say autumn despite the green
            in your eyes. Beauty despite
daylight. Say you’d kill for it. Unbreakable dawn
            mounting in your throat.
My thrashing beneath you
            like a sparrow stunned
with falling.

Ocean Vuong, from “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous,” Poetry (December 2014)

gaypocalypse:

"Hobbies: Confusing and converting monosexuals.”

ha ha, a funny joke. when have any “monosexuals” ever been targeted for conversion, never amirite? ha ha

Can you talk about how an American democracy of false equalities and empty universals might be connected to the kind of torture, and gender diverse tortures, we witnessed at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib?

The meaning lurking behind the model of “democracy” promulgated by the Bush administration is the fraudulent equality of the capitalist market, the freedom it illusively offers to all. Marx exposed long ago the profound inequalities that constitute the basis of what I still like to call bourgeois democracy. But the policies and pronouncements of the Bush administration amount to a parody of even those distortions. When democracy is reduced to the simple fact of elections- never mind that they were prepared by the mass brutality and destruction inflicted on Iraq by the US military- whatever we might consider to be freedom has disappeared. Those who present the gender and racial composition of the US military as a dramatic example of the equality offered by democracy have clearly lost sight of whatever promise democracy might hold for the future. Gender equality in the military is represented as the equal opportunity to participate in every aspect of military life, including equal opportunity to participate in the violence previous assumed to be the purview of men. This approach to equality leaves no space to challenge the status quo. The irony that women helped inflict the physical, mental, and sexual torture at Abu Ghraib is that their involvement points to the extrent to which this formal, abstract democracy has been successful in the military. When equality is measured in terms of access to repressive institutions that remain unchanged or even become strengthened by the admission of those who were previously barred, it seems to me that we need to insist on different criteria for democracy: substantive as well as formal rights, the right to be free of violence, the right to employment, housing, healthcare, and quality education. In brief, socialist, rather than capitalist conceptions of democracy.

Interview with Angela Y Davis in Abolition Democracy: Beyond Empire, Prisons, and Torture, 2005. (via mashrou3-ummi)

Angela Davis had some of the best American political analysis in the 1970s, and she remains top of the fuckin’ game in the 21st century too.

(via davethebrave)

[gallery]

typhonatemybaby:

Legendary Wolf.

i dont think teen wolf has actualy ever topped this moment.

leaveitopen:

women having to lie about their feelings and beliefs in order to avoid being killed and/or abused by you is not really the same as “passive aggression” or “manipulation” or “emotional abuse” on the woman’s part. nice try though.

nickluhohoho:

¿Cómo se dice “deez nuts?”

friend: promise you won't tell anyone
me: i promise
me: *tells my mom*

teachytv:

like the “it’s ok to be mentally healthy/straight/white” etc stuff I all expect from these kinds of posts but “its ok to have a happy family” ahahahaha holy shit

do you seriously see people complaining about their abusive dysfunctional families and feel LEFT OUT

thespacegoat:

doing nice things for homeless people and them filming their reactions voyeuristically from afar like they’re animals on the discovery channel is so fucked up why is it a popular thing to do

stonelions:

haven’t had a shep for a while 

lezbhonest:

I’m archiving old LGBT magazines and papers at the Center and just stumbled upon this gem

stonelions:

"There are days you’d swear this city was never any color other than gray. Gray ocean, gray sky. That’s Vancouver for you. I keep an ear on the comms, what comes through, at least. Mostly chatter from the orbital reconstruction sites. But I’m still hoping, you know? Maybe tomorrow. Maybe next week. Any time, Shepard. Beer’s cold.

I’m waiting.”

positivedoodles:

requested by bottlesofnerdfightingelephants

heteroromantic is not the same as heterosexual you can want to date men but be only sexually attracted to women and that makes you a lesbian

glowcloud-archive-deactivated20:

no if you want to date men youre still not a fucking lesbian im screaming

glowcloud:

Here’s an idea: when someone says “I am not personally comfortable with your use of this slur based on my personal experience” it’s not an opportunity to flex ur debate skills

ruxandralache:

A younger Solas.

glowcloud:

“hatred against furries is not-so-subtle queerphobia” this site not-so-subtly sucks

In America, the political spectrum runs all the way from not prosecuting torturers to actually being pro-torture

nawyougood:

when the burrito maker at chipotle doesnt tell the person working the register that you got double meat

youre smart

youre loyal

youre grateful

i appreciate that

c-poy:

Peak liberal identity politik wherein you can’t criticize a legitimately harmful act because you are not [X] identity. That’s the highest level of fostered individualism one can reach and of course, radical thoughts on the political subjectivity of womanhood get criticized for it because radical thought refuses to situate position above political subject matter. They get criticized by everyone because everyone has their heads lodged so far up their asses chanting “Choice! Choice! Choice!” 

Why does Bell Hooks always criticise dressing up, using makeup?

c-poy:

killdrugs:

bedpartymakeover:

1857-m-deactivated20150228:

Technically, it exposes the onus of being physically pleasing, upon women. I’ve seen people on this website try to turn makeup into a political gesture of empowerment and it still does not work. Whether cis women do it or trans women do it, makeup is essentially a social practice that demands a woman perform and display herself a certain way to be appealing to the public gaze. There’s someone on this website, I don’t remember their URL, but they have dyed hair (is all I remember) and they attempted to provide a more pro-woman stance on makeup which sounds superficially tempting but ultimately, makeup is self-defeating and bell hooks exposes that negation of true self in one simple quote of hers: “Think of all the women you know who will not allow themselves to be seen without makeup. I often wonder how they feel about themselves at night when they are climbing into bed with intimate partners. Are they overwhelmed with secret shame that someone sees them as they really are? Or do they sleep with rage that who they really are can be celebrated or cared for only in secret?”

She stands decidedly against the politics of glamorous power. Glamorous power is not the kind of power we ought to be teaching our young girls or adult women for that matter. Glamorous power enthralls, it captivates, it intrigues, it seduces patriarchal gaze but does it reclaim space, bodies, autonomy and does it crush patriarchal control over our bodies, our naked, exploitable, fuckable female bodies? No.

What is extremely important to remember whenever we read hooks is that this is an argument between neoliberal individualism/the bourgeois self-help movement against radical political struggles that wish to undo the damage of colonial, capitalist, imperial control over our bodies. hooks is entirely against choice feminism. So am I. So is anyone who realizes how utterly self-defeating and narrow choice feminism is when it comes to understanding the political and social subject of womanhood.

The same argument against dressing up and makeup can be seen through Lorde who insists that the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. Her statement is so rich with radical roots that it can be applied to a plethora of political struggles against hegemony. This is the beauty of their work.

bell hooks criticizes this and a lot more (bless her a million times) because bell hooks is completely against popular feminism. Popular feminism centers its politic of empowerment upon desire; it upholds the dominant structures of patriarchal control while turning political positions into aesthetic choices. And there is nothing more fascist than such a dishonest approach to women and autonomy. So, in other simpler words, makeup isn’t empowering anyone. It has its temporary rush (and I admit it too as someone who’s recently tried it at the age 25) but at the end of the day, will my wearing bronzer and mascara undo the patriarchal sociology of a man? Highly doubt it.

She also doesn’t like women presenting themselves provocatively. I don’t really agree with that or her opposition to makeup, but what do I know.

i think this post minimizes the economic undermining of the patriarchy that is possible, using makeup as a tool. when i say that, what i mean is: feminists, start your own makeup companies. employ other feminists. only buy makeup from feminist sellers. do not put money into the patriarchy’s hands.

anything is a tool tbh

Nope. That is similar to the argument that “feminist porn” is anti-patriarchy. Which is hilarious because it ignores entirely the mode of production in these industries. It ignores the division of labor, the disproportionate division of wages, the division of geographic inequality between the global north (mostly consumers) and the global south (mostly underpaid producers), it ignores a whole lot under the banner “Buy Feminist!” Under monopoly white supremacist capitalism, there is no such thing as ethical and empowered choices. It sounds pessimistic, sure, but it is a lot better than fooling yourself into believing such a postmodern idea that “anything is a tool” and can be used to liberate. Patriarchy will stop existing (among other results) when there is no more pressure on women to utilize cosmetic means to appear beautiful. Women will simply not have to consider the exhausting task of displaying themselves according to certain criteria. It will be a non-thing.

So no, “feminist makeup” is not feminist. You’re still teaching young girls to perform womanhood in a certain way that places a burden on them to appear pleasant to the eye. I will suggest you read these words on moving beyond the politics of desirability.